David E. Sopher
David Edward Sopher is a geographer (Ph.D., 1954) and the author of The sea nomads: a study of the maritime boat people of Southeast Asia, amongst other academic tomes. He was born on 26 February 1923 in Shanghai, China. He is married to Tressa Loveland Jaycox and has two children, Valerie and Jonathan, by a former marriage. =Academic institutions= A.B. Univ. of California, Berkeley (Geography) 1948; M.A. Univ. of California, Berkeley (Geography) 1950. Syracuse Univ. (since 1964) Professor of Geography. Univ. of Minnesota 1951-1954; Research Associate, American Geographical Society 1954-55; Sacramento State College 1954-62; Visiting Lecturer, Univ. of Calif., Berkeley, 1961-63. Project director, various ONR and NSF research programs in South Asia, 1957-date. =Books and Monographs= Geography of Indian Coasts. Reports. ONR NR 388-041, Contract Nonr 2329(00), 82 pp. 1958-1960. (Mimeo) The Indian Peoples and Their History. Language and Religion. In Raye E. Platt (ed.), India: A Compendium. New York: American Geographical Society, pp. 46-161, 1962. The Sea Nomads. Memoirs of the National Museum, Singapore. No. 5, 422 pp., 1965. (Revised, with postscript, Singapore, 1978.) Geography of Religions. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 118 pp., l967. (Map Editor) Historical Atlas of the Religions of the World. (with I.R. al Faruqi) New York: Macmillan, 346 pp., 1974. Braham and Untouchable: The Transactional Ranking of American Geography Departments. Syracuse University, Department of Geography Discussion Paper No. 10. 39 pp., 1975 (with James S. Duncan) Editor. An Exploration of India: Geographical Perspectives on Society and Culture. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, 334 pp., 1980. Editor. The City in Cultural Context. (with John Agnew and John Mercer) London: George Allen & Unwin, l983. =Articles= "Turmeric: a geographical investigation of cultural relations in Southeast Asia." Yearbook, Assoc. Pac. Coast Geogr., 7:11-15, 1950. "Arabic place names in Spain." Names, 3:5-13, 1955. "India's languages and religions." Focus, 6(6):1-6, 1956. "Post-war urbanization of the Santa Clara Valley." Bulletin of the California Council of Geography Teachers, 4(2):13-19, 1957. "Observations on strand habitats and cultures in South Asia." South Asia Colloquium, Center for South Asia Studies, U.C. Berkeley, 25 pp., 1959. (Mimeo) "Cultural landscapes of Portuguese India." Yearbook, Assoc. Pac. Coast Geogr., 22:34-39, 1961. "Population dislocation in the Chittagong Hills." Geogr. Review, 53(3):337-362, 1963. "The swidden/wet-rice transition zone in the Chittagong Hills." Annals, Assoc. Amer. Geogr., 54(1):107-126, 1964. "Landscapes and seasons: man and nature in India." Landscape, 13(3):14-19, 1964. "Indigenous uses of turmeric (Curcuma domestica) in Asia and Oceania." Anthropos, 59:93-127, 1964. "Indian boat types as a cultural geographic problem." Bombay Geogr. Magazine, 13(1):5-19, 1967. "Pilgrim circulation in Gujarat." Geogr. Review, 58(3):392-425, 1968. (Abstracted in Ekistics, 27(161):251-260, 1969.) "Religions: (map)." Britannica Atlas. Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., pp. 296-297, 1969. "Place and location: notes on the spatial patterning of culture." Social Science Quarterly, Sept., 1972. (Reprinted in Charles Bonjean and Louis Schneider (eds.), The Idea of Culture in the Social Sciences. Cambridge University Press. 1972.) "Essartage: système et symbole; réflexions sur les Marma et les peuples montagnards de l'Asie du Sud-est." Études rurales, No. 45, Jan.-March, 1972. "Toward a rediscovery of India: thoughts on some neglected Geography. In Marvin W. Mikesell (ed.), Geographers Abroad: Essays on the Problems and Prospects of Research in Foreign Areas. University of Chicago Department of Geography. Research Paper No. 152, pp. 110-133, 1973. Cultural Landscape and Regional Identity: Notes on a European Tour. Ljubljana: Syracuse Univ. Environmental Policy Project Report. 17 pp., 1973. "A measure of disparity." Professional Geogr., 26:389-392, 1974. "Indian pastoral castes and livestock ecologies: a geographic analysis." In L.S. Leshnik and G.D. Sontheimer (eds.), Pastoralists and Nomads in South Asia. Schriftenreihe des Sudasien-Instituts der Universitat Heidelberg. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, pp. 183-208, 1975. "Marriage migration in rural India." (with Michael J. Libbee) In L.A. Kosinski and R. Mansell Prothero (eds.), People on the Move: Studies on Internal Migration. London: Methuen, pp. 347-359, 1975. "Religion und Landschaft." In Martin Schwind (ed.), Religions-geographie. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, pp. 333-372, 1975. of Ch. 3 of Geography of Religions. "Rohilkhand and Oudh: an exploration of social gradients across a political frontier. In Richard G. Fox (ed.), Realm and Region in Traditional India. Duke University Program in Comparative Studies in Southern Asia. Monograph and Occasional Paper Series. Monograph No. 14, pp. 281-307, 1977. "The structuring of space in place names and words for place. In David Ley and Marwyn S. Samuels (eds.), Humanistic Geography: Prospects and Problems. Chicago: Maaroufa Press, pp. 251-268, 1978. "The landscape of home: myth, experience, social meaning." In D.W. Meinig (ed.), The Interpretation of Ordinary Landscapes. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 129-149, 1979. "Temporal disparity as a measure of change." Professional Geogr., 31:377-381, 1979. "Sex disparity in Indian literacy." In D.E. Sopher (ed.), An Exploration of India: Geographical Perspectives on Society and Culture. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, pp. 130-188, 1980. "The geographical patterning of culture in India." In D.E. Sopher (ed.), An Exploration of India. Cornell Univ. Press, pp. 289-326, 1980. "Indian civilization and the tropical savanna environment." In David R. Harris (ed.), Human Ecology in Savanna Environments. London: Academic Press, pp. 185-207, 1980. "Geography and religions." Progress in Human Geography, 5:510-524, 1981. "The message of place in Hindu pilgrimage." In E.A. Morinis (ed.), Crossing the Sacred Fords: Perspectives on Hindu Pilgrimage (Forthcoming) "Female migration in monsoon Asia: notes from an Indian perspective." Peasant Studies. (Forthcoming) =See also= *Orang Laut in Singapore =References= Category:General articles